


Homecoming

by Goldmonger



Category: Power Rangers
Genre: Gen, Pranks, Team Bonding, got that plot-hole for y'all, mighty morphin sassmasters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-03
Updated: 2017-04-03
Packaged: 2018-10-14 12:23:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10536402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goldmonger/pseuds/Goldmonger
Summary: Or, how Zack and Trini got weekend detention with the others.





	

The really excellent thing about their plan, Trini thought, was that even the others wouldn’t see it coming.

She glanced behind her to see Zack was still fumbling with his knapsack, his tongue sticking out the side of his mouth like he was being industrious about it.

“Stop stalling,” she cajoled, peering around the campus to make sure they hadn’t been spotted. “We’ve got like five minutes before the bell.”

“I’m not, it’s _stuck_ -,”

There was the pathetic ripping sound of old burlap, and Zack cleared his throat.

“Uh, got it.”

Trini rolled her eyes. The pair of them were crouched behind a gallery of Barb the Receptionist’s prize chrysanthemums, ducking whenever a student or teacher happened by. They were approximately twenty feet from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the biology laboratories, with a clear view of the class still in session. They were currently preparing to do their second stupidest act of the week, a tall order considering the first involved giant dinosaur robots.

Zack prodded Trini hard between her shoulder blades, and she rounded on him irritably. He was holding a vial of something clear up to the light, silver refracting onto the concrete path before them. A grin split his face, mischief dancing in his eyes.

“Last chance to back out, Crazy.”

“Screw that,” she said, snatching it from him with deadly speed. She turned, aimed, and fired it through the windows of the laboratory with the wild abandon of someone who has spent too much time around a loose cannon like Zack freaking Taylor.

The glass shattered, screams began, and they devoted a full fifteen seconds to pulling faces at the madly swivelling security camera before booking it down the school’s driveway.

 

*

 

Principal Feig’s ears were a curious beetroot colour, while the rest of him was porridge-grey. Trini tried to keep perfectly still, since that was supposed to work on enraged bears - unless it was a black bear, in which case you had to make yourself big and roar back. At least that was one of Billy’s factoids that she had stored away, however useful it may be in the future. Clearly not here.

“That lab will have to be closed off until next semester. Your little - _stink bomb_ , or whatever you call those - it sent Bobby Johnson to the nurse’s office! I don’t suppose you care about his deviated septum, or how his mother’s been on to me all morning about it. Mrs Davis - she is seventy-five, she was on the cusp of a damn heart attack, she thought one of you little weasels had fired off a gun! Biology and Chemistry classes will have to be held in ordinary classrooms until further notice, interrupting the curriculum and inconveniencing your teachers – not to mention jeopardising the studies of your fellow classmates!” Feig finally took a breath, a vein protruding in his temple.

“Do you have anything to say for yourselves?” he demanded.

Trini looked at Zack, who was absently picking at his teeth, eyes glazed. For him the job was done and dusted, this was just a necessary bridge to the resolution of the prank. She sighed.

“We’re like, sorry,” she said, affecting the laziest valley-girl voice in her considerable repertoire of sarcastic responses. “But it was like, funny,” she continued, twirling a lock of hair and letting her eyes wander to the window as though distracted. Apathy got authority more incensed than when they were being challenged, and she should know. Come on old man, she wanted to groan. Get it over with. Drop the hammer. Put that foot down. Rule with an iron –

“I think a lengthy stint in weekend detention should improve your attitudes,” Feig said caustically, and Trini felt herself begin to swell with triumph. His head snapped to the side, fixing Zack with a steely glare. “Should you treat this punishment as liberally as your school attendance, Mr Taylor, I can assure your expulsion will be imminent. You are hanging on to my patience by a thread as it is.” Zack nodded, halfway out of his chair, his hand already digging in his pocket for his knotted headphones.

Trini fought the smirk threatening to sell them out, and bowed her head contritely in Feig’s direction, sidling towards the door in Zack’s wake.

“8am this Saturday,” he barked after them. “Until summer vacation. Don’t make plans for that either just yet!”

He was left shouting at a door swinging on its hinges.

 

*

 

Jason called them idiots, and went to the cooler for more cans of soda. Billy was busy sketching the quarry’s depths to determine its volume, and barely acknowledged their news. Kimberly was doing a poor job of hiding how impressed she was.

“He didn’t suspect you at all?” she asked in disbelief.

Zack shrugged, snagging the soda Jason had just tossed to him out of the air without looking. “I get the feeling he doesn’t want to think too hard about the troublemakers of Angel Grove colluding,” he said, tightrope-walking up and down the edge of the cliff they had commandeered. “That sort of thing can lead to high blood pressure.”

“Still. It’s weird he didn’t notice.”

“That’s the fun thing about hanging with us,” said Trini dryly, lying back on the picnic blanket. “Even princesses get to be invisible.”

One of California’s spring heatwaves had wracked the town that day, warming the banks of the quarry well into the evening. The sun was melting into a palette that would make Power Rangers blush, the air light but warm, stars already winking above them. Trini could have drifted off there and then, but Kimberly was pelting her with grapes.

“I just meant that I thought we’d have caused more of a stir by now,” she was saying earnestly as she dodged Trini’s swipe. “Us hanging out together. It’s as good a scandal as that school gets.”

“Yeah, weird how a couple of kids eating lunch at the same table didn’t make the headlines instead of the giant robot battle that razed the town,” chirped Jason. “What _were_ they thinking.”

Trini smiled, her eyes still shut. Kimberly had found a new target to assault with the dregs of her fruit salad, judging by the yelps.

“I’m just glad we all get to hang out together on weekends now,” chimed in Billy, his pencil scratching away. “We can’t plan Ranger excursions without all the Rangers present and involved.”

Trini cracked an eyelid. “’Ranger excusions’?”

“Group trips to Starbucks,” supplied Jason.

“Vital stuff,” she retorted. “Obviously can’t be scheduled in a half a minute on Whatsapp or anything.”

“It was your idea, don’t put your hooliganism on us,” said Kimberly, methodically dropping granola down Jason’s collar while he was busy inspecting Billy’s drawing.

Well we couldn’t miss this, Trini thought, as Jason’s squawks and Zack’s guffawing laughter filled the twilit air. Not one more second of it.


End file.
